Ok, wet blanket time:
White Lightning contains paraffin, a.k.a. wax. Wax doesn't have much film strength ... i.e. it doesn't hold up to metal-on-metal or metal-on-otherstuff friction. It get's pushed aside, like snow and a snowplow.
Ever wonder why the automotive industry doesn't use wax in their axle grease or motor oil?
Ever notice that heavy industry doesn't use waxy lubes for pump seals or compressor seals/bearings, but use similar lubes as does the automotive industry...i.e. fairly ordinary lube oils?
Any refinery that runs "paraffinic crude oil" will have a 'dewaxing' unit ahead of their lube oil units. A dewaxing unit removes paraffin=wax, because nobody wants wax in their lube oil or grease.
It's because wax is a very poor lubricant. The only reason a waxy lube works on folding knives is because they:
1. usually have thin bushings that are slick by design, and when well designed need a very minimal amount of lube anyway (teflon and bronze are common bushings)
2. are a very low stress environment for lubes. Low pressure, low temperature, low dirt factor usually but not always, low wear unless you are flipping a bali all day.
About the only place I can think of where wax is an acceptable lube is for wooden drawers, and for pocket doors, to some degree, because it can embed in wood fibers (drawers) and stay on rollers/rails (pocket doors) and stay around a while.
I tried WL on my mountain bike chain. All I can say is that I couldn't make it more than about 1 to 1.5 hours into a 2-3 hour ride before my chain started squeaking, especially if we zipped through any small creeks. There simply wasn't enough actual lubricating going on, or "shedding" of dirt going on, to keep the dust/dirt from getting my chain just filthy, stripping off enough lube in the chain pins and rollers to cause metal-on-metal wear. And what
did stay around was dirt + wax mixture and that = abrasive sludge. At the end of the squeaky ride, I got to clean dirty abrasive sludge off my squeaking chain. Not good.
I think WL might work ok in some mountain biking situations (light, fine minimal dust maybe), but if so, you have to use a huge pile of the stuff, or stop and lube at the 1-2 hour mark on a dirty/wet ride. I.e., not very cost effective.
There are many superior lubricants out there for folding knives...here are a few:
1. Tri-Flow (very good lubricating properties, easy to find, most sporting goods stores)
2. Militec (on the web)
3. ProLink (bike shops, and yes, it is a metal friction reducer with a carrier)
4. ATB (hard to find, out of Arizona, more metal friction reducers, carried in an oxygenated solvent carrier which evaporates and leaves metal friction reducers behind)
5. Rock n Roll Lube (messy, but effective, contains teflon I think, in bike shops)
6. Teflon bearing greases (Tetra Gun Lube, CRK's "fluorinated grease")
etc...
...
...
3-in-1 oil (just ok stuff, kinda thick, but at least it's lube oil)
...
...
on down to WD-40 (very poor lube, 75% mineral spirits (evaporates), and 24.9% mineral oil, and some other fragrant stuff)
...
other poor lubes
...
...
Pedro's Ice Wax
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White Lightning.
I found that just ordinary work, including light duty pocket carry, contributed enough dirt and lint to my folders that I gave up on White Lightning after about a month (Yes, I look like Peanut's "Pigpen"... a cloud of dust follows me where ever I go
).
The Axis lock was especially susceptible to waxy buildup and mild grit/wax sludge in the lock mechanism. Gave it a gritty feel... like I had sand in the lock.
My folders do just dandy with a light lube, usually ATB (my bike stuff), Tri-Flow or BreakFree, and that lasts a long time. WL was very counterproductive.
Just one guy's wet blanke... er... experiences.
Your methods and results may vary.
